The European Union has expanded its anti-Russian sanctions list to 19 more people and nine new entities. The new sanctions contradict common sense and prevent the resolution of the Ukrainian internal conflict, Russia’s Foreign Ministry commented.

The newly sanctioned individuals include three
top military officials: Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov,
Russia’s First Deputy Defense Minister, Army General Arkady
Bakhin, and the head of the main Operation Directorate of General
Staff, Lieutenant General Andrey Kartapolov.

Two members of the
Russian lower house of parliament, the State Duma, singer Iosif
Kobzon and Valery Rashkin, who heads the Russian Communist Party
branch in Moscow, are also on the list. The remaining 14 people
are officials and field commanders of the self-proclaimed republics in
eastern Ukraine.

The entities added to the sanctions list consist of eight rebel
self-defense battalions and the Novorossiya public movement.

The EU blacklist now includes 151 citizens of Russia and
Ukraine’s self-proclaimed eastern republics and 37 Russian
companies and other entities.

The updated "blacklist," which was agreed February 9, was
published in the EU Official Journal on Monday and came into
force at the time of publication.

Restrictive measures include the freezing of the individuals’
assets in European Union countries and an EU-wide travel ban.

Moscow accused Brussels of doing the bidding of Kiev’s ‘party of
war’ and noted the irrationality of broadening sanctions against
Russia and the rebel authorities at a time when hope had emerged
for a peaceful resolution to the Ukrainian crisis.

Aleksey Pushkov, the chairman of the State Duma’s Foreign Affairs
Committee, has tweeted that the new EU sanctions, adopted
February 9, are “going to be contrary to the results of Minsk
[peace agreements]. These sanctions will not solve anything, but
will complicate the political dialogue.”

Russia’s representative to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, told
journalists that further extension of sanctions would not promote
accomplishment of the Minsk agreements on the Ukrainian crisis.

“This will not only give a signal to Russian public opinion
and force Russia to return to our own sanctions list, but will
dissuade both sides of the conflict from the active
implementation of the provisions of the Minsk documents,”
Chizhov said.

The EU’s expanded sanctions against Russia come after the
successful 16-hour Minsk peace talks between the leaders of
Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine, aimed at promoting a
ceasefire in Ukraine.

The Minsk ceasefire
agreement envisages a complete end to hostilities in Ukraine,
which came into force starting from midnight Sunday, February 15,
and remains an effective measure to stop bloodshed in the east of
Ukraine, where pro-Kiev regular troops and Ukrainian volunteer
battalions are fighting with rebel forces. Regular shelling in
the region has left thousands of civilians dead.

In turn, Russian officials said last week that Moscow will not
disclose the names on its blacklist introduced as a reciprocal
measure for the new individual sanctions introduced by the EU
against Russian citizens.

“In the long term, sanctions against Russia endanger Europe’s
security of supply,” observed Igor Sechin, CEO of Russia’s
energy giant Rosneft, in an article published in the Financial
Times on Sunday.

There is a lack of unity in the EU over the need for new
restrictive measures within the bloc, with the losses suffered by
the EU in the “sanctions war” with Russia now put at €21 billion
($24 billion).

"Sanctions have had a heavy cost for us all,” said Jose
Manuel Garcia-Margallo, the Spanish foreign minister. “In Spain,
we have been badly hit in terms of agriculture and tourism,"
he said.